UK Casinos Enact Social Responsibility Changes

As of the 31st October 2015 the new LCCP UK Gambling Commission changes come into effect for all UK regulated online casinos bringing in a raft of changes to responsible gambling policies.

The first set of changes that came into effect earlier this year in February 2015 were primarily focused on the marketing tactics of online casinos, ensuring that customers and players are well informed of the terms of each available promotion on offer at the casino as well as providing the ability for players to “Self-Exclude” for a minimum of 6 months from the casino.

This move forced casinos into more clearly displaying wagering and turnover requirements with the UKGC laying down the law in regards to casino welcome bonuses and laid the responsible gambling foundations to protect vulnerable players.

All October 2015 changes are laid out in the LCCP summary of key changes and include an extension to the Responsible Gambling enactments that came into effect In May 2015.

Customers must be offered a ‘time out’ facility for reasonable durations up to 6 weeks.

The new responsible gambling provisions must be put into practice by all UK casinos to allow players to temporarily take a break for a short term period up to a maximum of 6 weeks. This will not impact the existing self-exclusion options already put into place earlier this year.

Other minor amendments to the regulatory policy also include providing exclusion via telephone and customer service as well as changes to auto-play enforcing loss limits that can be configured in increments of 24 hours, 7 days and a month.

These new rules provide more mechanisms for support and protecting online casino players and ensure that online casinos operating within the UK casino market are providing the tools that enable players to appropriately manage gameplay in responsible way. We expect to see the next round of revisions include the provision of a national database for self-exclusions adding yet more measures to protect online casino players.